To Fight

Magdalo, Cardo, Roberto, and Marlo stood before the five Wither Bees that came out of the cave as the young knight runs back home to get the honey for his ill sister.

Magdalo and the others thought it would be a headache to confront five Wither Bees at the same time. And indeed it will.

The creatures went after the young knight who's carrying the bottle of honey, ignoring Magdalo and the others.

The Wither Bees' purpose for chasing them down outside the beehive is to not let a single person escape and tell other people about their precious honey made by none other than the Mother Bee which is said to be capable of healing almost everything.

Seeing Riko carrying a bottle of honey makes him the one person that needs to be eliminated no matter what, hence why they aimed all their stings towards him.

'Damn it!'

Riko's body would not listen to him. On the other hand, the stings are now deadly close behind the young knight. Riko braces himself for the inevitable. But then, moving as swift as a lightning strike, Roberto comes to the rescue.

"Down!"

The knight throws himself towards Riko, pushing the young knight out of the sting's way. But as a result, Roberto's limbs are struck by three stings.

"Tch!"

Crash!

The two crash-landed on the ground.

"Roberto, Riko!"

Magdalo, Cardo, and Marlo tried to get to Riko and Roberto hurriedly. But at that moment, the Wither Bees split up into two groups. Two of them tries to block the three from trying to get to Riko and Roberto.

"The other Wither Bees went for Riko and Roberto!" Cardo shouted.

"Damn it! Marlo!"

"Out of the way!!"

Marlo, with his magic ability, tries to shoot the Wither Bees down with a volley of hardened dirt. However, the Wither Bees are fast enough to dodge all of them rather easily.

"Lakas!"

Marlo manipulates the shape of the surface to give Magdalo a high ground to jump to and go straight at one of the Wither Bees. The creature that sees him coming avoids his blade, then the other goes after Magdalo as soon as he descended back to the ground.

Buzz!!

"Keh!"

Clang!

The veteran knight uses his blade to protect himself against the Wither Bee and its sting. The other tries to go help its fellow Wither Bee but was quickly intercepted by Marlo and his hail of rock and dirt.

"We can't get rid of them unless they are distracted, but we can at least hold them off." Uttered Magdalo as he shoved the Wither Bee away. "Cardo! Marlo and I will give you an opening. Go help Roberto and Riko."

"... All right!" Cardo replied reluctantly.

Marlo and Magdalo confront the two Wither Bees one more time. And while they do, the two knights are trying to lure the monsters out of Cardo's way.

'There it is!'

At last, Cardo sees an opening and dashes straight for Riko and Roberto. But then, as he looks forward and sees the three Wither Bees already deadly close to the two while he's extremely far away from them, he shouted in his thoughts:

'I'm not gonna make it!'

"Are you all right, Riko?"

"You should ask that question yourself!"

Riko and Roberto finally noticed the Wither Bees coming their way, but they can't move fast enough with Roberto's limbs withering by the second.

Meanwhile, Cardo tightens his grasp on his magic sword.

'They're distracted, I can kill them! But I can't control the trajectory of my sword wave at full power!'

Cardo stops moving forward. He then raised his sword in the air with both hands, his arms start shaking nervously as the blade begins to emit strong blue light.

'Should I risk it?'

***

Sometime after they deliberate their plan to drive Lyrica away from their town to Riko, Cardo asks Magdalo after they scatter:

"If this plan goes well, and if Lyrica does come back, what do we do?"

Magdalo looks at Cardo with bewildered eyes, following his question to the veteran knight.

"Of course, we will fight."

After that response, Magdalo observes the worried expression on Cardo's face.

"Are you worried about something?" Said Magdalo towards Cardo.

The knight looks down, worried, trying to find the right words to respond.

"... I'm not afraid of death, nor am I afraid of fighting." Cardo furrows his brows as he gets troubled to get the words right out of his mouth. "But I... I'm afraid I'm still weak."

***

Cardo is born with mana which is what enables magic users to perform magic. However, unlike everyone else, he has yet to awaken his ability.

Normally, magic abilities awaken within a person from a young age. Oftentimes, magic abilities are inherited from their parents. Other times, people awaken magic abilities unique for themselves. But Cardo is different, which forces him to rely on a magic tool.

For years, he uses countless magic tools.

"What do I need to do to awaken my magic? A family of magic users? To put my life in danger? To be who I am? What do I want to do with my life?"

Despite decades of waiting, Cardo never awakened any magic abilities. Eventually, he gave up waiting. Then one day, something happened in Kruule.

"Please, don't kill me! Pleas–"

"Somebody help! My son is bleeding out! Some–ack!"

The Hari showed his true colors.

"C-Cardo! Help me!"

"Celine!"

His wife was taken away along with the others, especially women.

"Ama...!"

"Aron!"

Whoom~!!

"Boom! Blast off!"

"His head flew off! Incredible!"

"Hahaha!"

His son was beheaded right in front of him.

"Those who do not obey... Those who try so much as to think of rebelling against the kingdom, against me, dies!"

The Hari forced his kingdom to follow his tyrannical rule.

The people wanted Kruule to return to how it used to be—a kingdom where its ruler doesn't make the people suffer. A peaceful kingdom. But as time passes, their hopes for that peace are dwindling little by little. Just when they thought all hope is lost, Cardo and the others met Lyrica.

Lyrica gave the impression of a serious and unapproachable girl who shows very little emotion even in a dire situation like confronting the Guardian Snake.

At first, Cardo thought Lyrica is someone who doesn't care much about anything, not even her life. But through so little time that Cardo and the others spent being around Lyrica, they learned that not only does she have a sense of selflessness, but she can also be expressive and self-assertive at times.

Lyrica is not afraid to express what she feels, nor is she afraid to tell people what she thinks about them. Cardo saw this side of Lyrica when she tries to drive Riko away by reminding him what happened back in the Forest of No Return which is escaping alive purely by luck.

Cardo and everyone else knows little about Lyrica, but as time passes, they begin to see that the girl who came from another world, though claimed not as a hero, might be the person that will save them all from the Hari.

"...!"

Thump!

Cutting back to the present, instead of trying his luck as they did back in the forest, Cardo puts his sword down and dashes forth with all the strength and stamina he has. Along the way, he asked himself in his thought:

'I want power, I want to awaken my own magic ability. But why do I need it? Why do I need power?'

Lyrica is indeed capable. They've literally put all their hopes into her. A hope that if she ever really returns, it would mean their freedom.

'If it all comes to pass, we can't just let Lyrica shoulder all the burden.' Cardo thought to himself.

It's their own long-sought freedom, and if they want it, they can't just let Lyrica give it to them. And so, Cardo asks himself one more time:

'Why do I need power?'

At that moment, as he gritted his teeth, Cardo suddenly glows with bright light. And as it disappeared within his body, his agility blasts off.

'Because I need the power to fight!'

Screeechhh...!

Though it's faint, Riko and the others, including the Wither Bees heard a cry coming from deep into the cave entrance.

The scream had the Wither Bees halt as they all looked towards the entrance.

"It's our chance!" Riko uttered in a whispering manner.

He carries Roberto and tries to create a distance between him and the monsters.

However, before Riko could do so much as drag Roberto and himself by a short distance. An image of Cardo who's about to strike all three Wither Bees with his long sword that's emitting an overflowing amount of mana appears before his brown eyes.

"Cardo...?"

Bwhoo~!

Before the Wither Bees realized it, Cardo swung his long sword diagonally, creating a giant and powerful sword wave that severed the creatures completely in half.

'I need the power to fight and help bring back our freedom!'